Life sentence for man who raped stepdaughter

The persistent questions a KwaZulu-Natal mother asked her daughter have led to the arrest and life sentence of her husband who had been raping the teenager over a period of two years.

The Ulundi Regional Court convicted and sentenced the 25-year-old man to an effective life imprisonment for raping his 16-year-old stepdaughter, police spokesperson Major Thulani Zwane said on Tuesday.

“The accused started to rape the victim since November 2012 while her mother was at work. On 30 November 2014, the mother was coming back from work and she noticed that her daughter was not at home.

“The victim returned a while later and her mother asked her where she was. She told her mother that she was with her friends but her mother was not satisfied with her explanation.

“[The] mother continued to question her until she told her that she preferred to tell the police about what happened to her. The victim was then taken to the police where she told the police that she was raped by her stepfather.”

Zwane said a case of rape was opened at Ulundi police station for investigation. The Ulundi Family Violence, Child Protection and Sexual Offences Unit took over the investigation, which led to the arrest of the man.